Dr. Kudchadkar Discusses Melanoma Testing

Ragini Kudchadkar, MD, assistant professor, medical oncology, Moffitt Cancer Center, discusses testing for melanoma.

If a patient with melanoma is not on a clinical trial, Kudchadkar says, they need to be tested to see if they have a chance to benefit from a targeted therapy. Though BRAF mutational status is typically looked at in patients with stage IV disease, most physicians believe that a high-risk patient with stage III disease should also be tested. This population of patients has a high risk of recurrence, Kudchadkar says, sometimes as high as 70%. Kudchadkar says she does not recommend testing patients with early stage disease, as they can be cured with surgery alone.